


Paths That Join

by mmmdraco



Category: Hikaru no Go
Genre: Community: blind_go, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-17
Updated: 2012-07-17
Packaged: 2017-11-10 04:25:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/462175
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mmmdraco/pseuds/mmmdraco
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Walking seperate paths, they ended up walking together. Includes minor character death. (Blind Go entry - round #12)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Paths That Join

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own the characters, I mean no harm, I have no money... Stuff like that. Yeah.

Akira watched Hikaru leave the game room and noted his tensed shoulders. Without speaking, he followed the other man to the vending machines and handed over a 100 yen coin when Hikaru came up empty-handed after digging in his pockets. This was all pretty normal Hikaru behavior for any time he had a loss. Akira knew that if he spoke first, no matter what the topic was, Hikaru would blow up at him. He'd learned to stay silent until the other man spoke first. Today, he didn't make the first sound by speaking. He punched the vending machine. "Damn it!" he yelled as he nursed his fist with his other hand.

Making the other man's selection on the vending machine for him, Akira handed over the cold green tea and watched as Hikaru gently pressed it against his hand. "What's this about, then? You lost to Morishita again, I suppose."

"Yes, I did. I just can't seem to keep a winning streak going. I win two, then lose one. How does anyone get to be a 9-dan at this rate?"

Akira took another 100 yen coin from his pocket and bought a bottle of water. As he opened it, he spoke toward the mouth of the bottle. "I can't speak for anyone else, and I know I can't speak for you because we've had entirely different experiences with learning go, but I think that the reason you're not advancing as fast as you might like has to do with the fact that your technique is still flawed."

Finishing off his tea, Hikaru crushed the can in his uninjured hand and glared at Akira. "Flawed technique? I beat you in our last official match."

"You misunderstand me. I don't mean that you don't play a good game of go. You do. You've played many wonderful games; even ones that you've lost. But you still play poorly in your transitions. It could be that you're seeing so far ahead that you fail to see what's right in front of your eyes. Your yose technique could be tightened up. Those big, charasmatic plays that characterize your game? You have those down beautifully. Now it's the simple technique you need to master."

"You think I haven't worked my ass off at learning all of this? I've been studying for years, Akira!" He threw the can in the recycling bin and tried not to wince at how loud of a noise it made. "I study kifu every night. Twice a week, I'm in study groups. I play you more than can possibly be healthy. I play Waya and Isumi and Fukui and Honda. I play the old guys at that go parlor. I play Akari. I play my grandfather. My life is go, Akira. I eat it, sleep it, breathe it, and bleed it. If I were any more entrenched in it, I'd be committed."

Akira shook his head. "You think I'm not the same way? I am! Only I've been this way since I could sit at the board and place stones on it. I've got something like eight years of experience over what you have had, and I was just as studious as you, if not moreso, over the course of that time. You're only 22, Hikaru. Same here. We were hitting puberty at the same time that we became go pros. But now we're getting into the levels where people whom we have respected as players are our competition. If is difficult." He took a long drink of his water. "For a Go player, 22 is still very young. Look at Kuwabara. At his age, and for the number of years that he has played, he is still discovering things about the game, He is a title holder not because he is the best, but because he has learned many ways of holding on to a game that we won't figure out for years. Yet for all his bluster, and the same goes for Ogata, they're afraid of us because we are nearly on their level and still so much younger. We may not hold titles ourselves yet, but when was the last time that either of us didn't get into the league to determine the challenger? It's been years. There are players here, like Morishita, who got to the 9-dan ranking, and they are worthy of it, but they will never be what we can be. The fact that you are weak in technique and are still winning so often is what makes people take notice."

"I doubt they're still taking notice, Akira." Sitting down and kicking his feet up on an ottoman, Hikaru leaned his head back and closed his eyes, but his hands gripped tightly on the arms of the chair.

"I know they are, Hikaru, because I'm still taking notice. You said it yourself that we play almost every day. I know your style of playing now, and I recognize your weaknesses, and I see the mistakes you make, and I tell myself I can conquer them all because I can see them. But then you bring out that move no one else would think of, and you beat me sometimes. When I think of the player you'll be when you can finally clear yourself of those small worries, I get excited. I get excited, Hikaru, because I see how close you are to the Hand of God without even realizing it!" Hikaru's eyes flew open.

"Do you really think so?" He leaned forward with hope shining in his eyes.

"Of course I do. Would I bother standing here talking about this if I didn't believe in you?!" Akira huffed out a breath and sat next to Hikaru. "I've never understood why you have such a problem with your confidence."

"No? Hmm..." Hikaru licked his bottom lip casually. "I guess it's that no one in my family really even knows what I do for a living. My grandfather does a little since he's a go player, but even he has a hard time explaining it to my parents. My dad has never been to one of my matches. My mom came to the Hokuto Cup one day and left before I turned everything around and hasn't been back since. They let me go about doing whatever I want to do because I'm bringing in a lot of money and my grandfather assures them that this is considered an actual job in Japan, so they aren't to be considered bad parents."

"Does your hand feel better yet?"

"Yeah. I should know better by now not to use my go hand."

"You should know better by now not to go around punching things. There are things that deserve your anger and things which do not. If you are angry and do not have a proper outlet, then you must channel that into something constructive."

"What? Like macrame?" Hikaru snorted and slumped down in his chair again.

"No, like your studies, your games... Your go! You're so dense sometimes! You have all of this charisma and passion inside of you that you let loose on unsuspecting victims, and if you would turn it where it would do some good, then..." He stood and walked a few steps, but kept his back to Hikaru. "You are the player who is closest to the Hand of God. I'm certain of it. Now forget about everyone else's approval. Gain your own. I wouldn't give mine to anyone who didn't deserve it, would I?" He turned his head back to Hikaru with his eyes blazing with emotion. Akira walked off and left Hikaru slouched in a chair staring at the air where he had been.

Hikaru didn't show up at the go salon the next day or the day after, but Akira wasn't too worried. They didn't play every day, after all. Most days, certainly, but it wasn't unprecedented for Hikaru to avoid everyone else for a few days after a loss. It was therefore a surprise to get a phone call from the Nihon Ki-in telling him that his match for the next session was postponed. His next opponent was to have been Hikaru.

After hanging up the phone, Akira pulled out his address book and leafed through it to find Hikaru's phone number. They had exchanged numbers, but very rarely used them as they typically knew where to find one another. Chance brought them together often enough that they didn't usually need to stay in touch, but this wasn't one of those times. He picked up the phone again and dialed the number. Hikaru's mother answered politely, though she sounded like her nose was stopped up. "Hello, is Hikaru there?" He tried to keep the questioning tone from coming across, but it broke through regardless.

"Is this Akira-kun?"

"Yes, it is."

"Hikaru said you might call. He mentioned something about your game."

"It's been postponed, I've been told."

"I hope Hikaru will be all right by then. He isn't in much shape to be doing much of anything at the moment."

Akira's throat went dry. "Has something happened to him? He wasn't in an accident, was he?"

"No. We've had a death in the family. Hikaru's grandfather passed away."

"My condolences," Akira said automatically. "Was Hikaru particularly close to his grandfather?" He paused a moment. "That is, if you don't mind my asking."

"Hikaru grew much closer to his grandfather once he started playing go. He even seemed okay about his passing until the will was read. Heihachi has been holding on to an antique go board for years, and he's given that to Hikaru. Once he heard that, Hikaru became rather upset. I'm sorry that your game had to be postponed. My husband and I planned the services before asking Hikaru."

"You didn't realize he had a game every Thursday?" Akira had heard Hikaru talking about his parents' ignorance of his job, but didn't believe how far it extended.

There was a long pause on the other end of the line; long enough that Akira nearly hung up the phone, but Hikaru's mother did finally speak. "Hikaru has never been particularly forthcoming about what he does. He doesn't get in trouble, and he goes out every day for some reason or another. He isn't the only one whose schedule we had to consider. Thank you for your concern, Akira-kun. I will make sure my son knows that you called. Goodbye."

Great. Just great! He placed the phone back in the receiver and sighed. He had only wanted to talk to Hikaru to make certain the other man was okay, and then he'd managed to offend his mother! Maybe he should go over to see Hikaru, but in addition to not wanting to see Hikaru's mother so shortly after angering her, he hadn't even actually ascertained during the phone call as to whether Hikaru was at home or not. Hikaru would come to him if he needed him, Akira supposed. He looked at his watch and decided he could get in a bit of studying before the go parlor would close for the night. He grabbed his keys and wallet and headed out the door.

It wasn't until Thursday that Akira saw Hikaru again. Since their match had been postponed, Akira decided to use the time for a day off. Typically, he filled holes in his schedule with the various last-minute offers to teach that popped up when other pros had to cancel. He was happy to do it because he liked being reliable. But he'd been working non-stop for years, and it would probably be good to relax. That didn't mean he wouldn't play go if he ran into the right opponent. He was out walking along the river and enjoying the mild summer they were having. As he walked under a bridge, he thought he heard his name being called, so he looked around. "Look up!" He did and saw Hikaru smiling down to him.

It took Akira a few moments to find the steps back onto the road, but Hikaru met him by them. "Sorry about our game," he said first. "And my mom."

"I was the one who offended your mother, Hikaru. I should go apologize. Is she around?"

Hikaru shook his head and the two of them started walking at an easy pace with no particular direction. "No. The rest of the family headed off right after the service. They're kind of angry with me."

Akira stopped. "Was it because of what I said?"

Hikaru turned slightly and pulled Akira's sleeve to urge him back into motion. "No. It's a lot of things. I know my mom told you that my grandfather left me his antique goban, but she neglected to mention the thing he left me that pissed everyone else off." He pointed at the building behind him. "He left me his house."

Akira's eyes went wide. "Was he well off?"

Hikaru strode slowly up the steps. "Not particularly. He had this house and enough to live on, plus a bunch of antiques. I'm not sure what he was thinking when he left me so much. Everyone else got a little bit of money, plus his estate covered all of the fees for everything, and there were other antiques that were distributed... I never expected this. Everyone else is holding it against me. We aren't a very large family, I suppose. It's me, my parents, two uncles and an aunt and three cousins. They think I spent time over here telling my grandfather stories about them to get him to leave me the most. This isn't a large house, but it's in a good location, it's in good repair, and I think my grandfather thought I wouldn't move out of my parents house if I wasn't forced to. So, here we go." He opened the door and led the way inside.

"Your parents kicked you out." Akira was dumbfounded. Was his family really that petty?

"Not really, I guess." He led the way into the living room and gestured for Akira to have a seat. Hikaru took the seat opposite Akira. "They suggested that since I have this house, maybe I should use it. They also suggested that I start paying more rent and utilities if I wanted to continue living at home."

"You'd been paying rent?" Akira suddenly appreciated the fact that his parents had always been very accomodating of his needs, and glad that he'd taken to having extra 100 yen coins in his pocket for when Hikaru wanted a drink but wasn't carrying any coins.

"Since I was making more money than my father, it made sense to foot part of the bill. I gave my parents a fourth of everything I earned."

"For most of the last decade?"

"Around that. Yeah. Haven't you given your parents anything?" Hikaru shook his head. "Then again, your dad must be loaded. He's had those titles so long, plus all the money he must get paid for just showing up places..."

"And you told your grandfather this?"

"I guess. He liked to ask how things were going as we played go. I would always just ramble off about whatever was happening in my life."

"Did it ever occur to you that a fourteen year old boy shouldn't be paying rent, and the fact that you paid so much of it might be the reason why your grandfather left you his house?"

"I was being a good son, Akira. I wasn't always the best when it came to other things, so the least I could do-"

"The least you could do was put the money away to buy your family extravagent presents when the occasion called for it!"

"Did you expect me to be an ungrateful brat? I had a job, Akira! A good one! It was the least I could do to buy groceries and make sure my dad could have some new clothes for work and my mom could have new shoes when she found a pair she liked!"

Akira breathed in slowly through his nose. "I can see we're at an impasse. Let's suffice it to say that I believe I can see why your grandfather did what he did and leave it at that. I don't want to argue with you about this."

Hikaru was breathing quickly still and looked like he wanted to get up. "Yeah, okay."

"Would it help if I apologized to your mother?"

Hikaru quirked a smile suddenly and shook his head. "No. I already apologized on your behalf as I was moving out."

"Hikaru-"

"It's okay. Really. I've never been as close with my parents as you are with yours. This is just going to take some time. As you said, I'm 22 years old. There's plenty of time for a lot of things. I can learn better go technique and I can make things up with my family and... I can live alone."

"Do you even know how to cook?"

"I can make-"

"Please tell me you can make something other than instant ramen."

Hikaru smiled sheepishly. "Toast?"

"How many bedrooms is this place?"

"Two. Why?"

"Need a roommate?" Akira raised an eyebrow at his longtime rival.

Hikaru sat forward in his chair. "What? Why?"

"Because I'm seeing a lot of good points to it. If I don't move out now, I also might never do so. Additionally, I can help teach you those go moves that you aren't as good at. And between us, we might manage."

"I'm not useless, Akira."

"Neither am I, but that doesn't mean that I trust myself to make certain that the bathroom is clean and the floors are swept and there's extra toilet paper all by myself."

Hikaru scowled. "Toilet paper. I knew I forgot to bring something over."

"I'm certain there are a lot of things that aren't here which you'll discover you wish were."

"You are serious about this, right?" Hikaru sat back again. "Let's try it and see?"

Akira stood up and looked around. "It might be a little while before I can actually move in since my parents are on vacation at the moment and I would like to sit down and talk to them about it first. Until them, we can discuss the logistics of everything such as payment, chores, and all of that."

"Payment?"

"If I'm going to live here, I'm going to help out with groceries, utilities, taxes. I figure that we can probably get by with creating a budget, then contributing a set amount to a household account and have our bills automatically deducted, and then just go shopping together once a week, or as we have time."

"Did you just think of all of this?"

Akira laughed. "Sometimes I still swear you're a different person when you're playing go. That's the only time you ever think ahead. Now, would you like to give me a proper tour?"

It was nearly a month later by the time Akira managed to get everything prepared to move. His parents had been understanding once they'd finally come home, but his schedule was such that packing was a logistical nightmare. Hikaru had come over to help him a few times, but they kept stopping to play go, so very little actually got accomplished. It wasn't until Ichikawa-san got word of his plight that his problems were solved. She simply offered to pack for him if he'd watch the counter during her shift since she'd gotten a last minute date. Hikaru came over during the shift and they played at the very first table so he could watch the door and the counter properly.

Hikaru and Akira made certain not to make any plans for the Wednesday before their postponed game had been rescheduled. Akira chartered a small moving van and had his things delivered to the house in the late morning. Hikaru was waiting at the front door with a cup of tea for him. Together, with help from the driver from the moving company, they moved in all of Akira's boxes, his futon and a few pieces of furniture, his computer, and his very delicately wrapped goban. Once the larger pieces of furniture were in place, Akira sent away the driver with his thank you and a signed work order. He had worn old, comfortable clothing, not knowing how much cleaning he might need to do before being able to get his things where we wanted them. He was pleased to see that Hikaru had managed to keep the place clean, and said so.

Hikaru rubbed his nose with the back of his finger. "It seems my grandfather had a cleaning lady. She showed up the day after you saw the place. She's an older lady, and I'm pretty sure this is a big part of her income, so I didn't have the heart to tell her we wouldn't be using her services. Don't worry, though. I already told her that she isn't to move anything that's on top of a goban."

"I certainly won't mind not having to clean toilets."

"That's what I figured. So, I covered up all of the boards here so we wouldn't be as tempted to play a game before your stuff is all in place. What can I help with?"

"Um..." Akira glanced back at his boxes, stacked somewhat precariously against the wall of the room. "If you could seperate the boxes by category while I go ahead and hang up my clothes?"

"Category?"

"Ichikawa-san did it. She's got it labeled by things like clothes, office supplies, kifu, books, awards certificates, personal stuff, and I don't even know what else."

"No girlie mags?"

"Hikaru!"

"What?!"

"I don't particularly see the appeal of them, and I definitely wouldn't have had them in the room that my mother cleaned, let alone that Ichikawa-san packed."

Hikaru shrugged. "That's cool. I don't have any either. You just seemed like the type who would."

"Waya is the type who would."

"Oh, yeah. Waya definitely has some."

Akira shuddered a little and grabbed his garment bag. He opened the closet and began hanging up his suits. He had a suitcase filled with his shirts and ties and a few sweaters, but the rest of his clothing had been packed in boxes. He was about to turn around to grab the suitcase when Hikaru slid a box across the floor toward him. "Your shoes!" he called out.

Deftly moving the box against the wall next to the closet, he found the suitcase and pulled it over. He started to hang his shirts up in order by color and he heard Hikaru snort behind him. "What's so funny?"

"Your shirts. You have more shirts in purple than you do any other color. Oh, hey, do you want your ties over there?"

"Yes, please. And there's nothing wrong with purple. It's the color of royalty."

"It's the color of girls!" Hikaru said as he dropped the box of ties on top of the box of shoes.

Akira looked at Hikaru and stuck out his tongue. "I happen to like it. Besides, you wore a pink shirt to a game just a few months ago."

"My mom washed my shirt with her sweater and I didn't know so I didn't have time to change!"

"You looked good in it."

Hikaru laughed. "I did, didn't I?"

"When you're done sorting, would you mind putting my books on the shelf by the window?"

"Sure." Hikaru grabbed the first box and moved it over. "How do you want it?"

"Kifu collections on the top three shelves, fiction on the next two shelves, and everything else on the bottom. In theory, it should have just been pulled off the shelf how I had it, so it shouldn't be too difficult to get it close to that."

"Right."

Akira grabbed the next box (socks and underwear) and they unpacked in companionable silence. When several empty boxes had accumulated, Akira broke them down and moved them out into the hallway. "Would you like to take a break in a little while to eat? My mother sent over some rice balls."

"Yes. So much yes," Hikaru said as he wiped a bead of sweat that had rolled down his face.

"We're nearly done, I think. If you'll empty those office supplies into the top drawer of my desk and the award certificates into the bottom one, I'll climb behind there and hook up the computer."

"Done deal." Hikaru paused in a crouch with the first box in hand. "I assume you're going to want Internet for that computer." He stood up and looked at Akira as he blew a piece of hair away from his own eye.

"I don't need it right away, but it would be nice to get in the future. I do most of my banking online."

"I'm still not terribly good with computers. Technology tends to defeat me."

Akira pulled the blanket off the computer monitor and dug into the box he'd coiled all of the cables into. "I'll be happy to teach you a little more about how to use one. It's a good skill to have, even if our job doesn't really require it. Even Ogata manages, though."

"That sounds good." There was more silence until suddenly Hikaru screamed, "Ah! Your stupid stapler bit me!"

Rolling his eyes slightly, Akira crawled back out from under the desk and looked at Hikaru sucking on his finger. "Let me see."

"It hurts!"

"I'm sure it does, but if you have a piece of staple stuck in your finger, it might be a good idea to get it out now before the wound heals over."

Hikaru held out his hand, but refused to look at it. "Is it bad?"

Akira snorted softly. "Take a look at it yourself." Hikaru had managed to staple the very edge of the callus on his index finger. There wasn't even any blood!

Hikaru looked chagrined and took a moment to carefully unbend the staple and slide it from his finger. "It still pinched a lot."

"I'm certain it hurt like childbirth."

"Oh, don't start on that, and NEVER say that around my friend Akari." Blowing on his finger lightly, Hikaru placed the used staple on the edge of Akira's desk. "She has two kids, all natural birth, and she told me WAY too much about it. Thank God I didn't know what all of the things were that she was referring to because I bet they were all gooey and pulpy and gross."

"I'll make certain not to mention it." He looked around. The only things left to do were attach a few more cables, put up some photographs, and unwrap his goban. "Shall we go have our snack now?"

Hikaru brewed a small pot of green tea as Akira brought out the rice balls his mother had pressed insistently into his hand as he kissed her cheek goodbye earlier. As Hikaru took the first bite, he smiled. "I haven't had rice balls in a while. Since my dad went to his last health check-up, my mom has been making healthier food. You'd think rice balls would go right with that, but she just makes these big batches of things, so we were having a lot of leftovers. Mom made this huge pot of stewed vegetables that she kept forcing on us until my dad snuck down in the middle of the night and left it on the counter so it would spoil. Our kitchen smelled gross for a whole week!"

Brushing a small piece of rice off of his cheek with the side of his thumb, Akira smiled. "We should also attempt to have a somewhat bhealthy diet. Ashiwara has offered to come over to teach us how to cook some simple dishes if you would like"

Hikaru took a deep breath and nodded as he looked into his tea cup. "I guess that's something that would be good to know." He took a sip of his tea and looked up at Akira, his eyes crinkling slightly in the corners as he smiled. "Thank you, by the way. You know, for saving me from myself."

Akira poured another measure of tea into his cup. "My father told me when I was younger that a true go player will spend their life chasing the Hand of God. He asked me last night if that was why I was doing this. And I think it is part of the reason. I think the rest of it is just that we're friends. With what we do, friends are hard to make. And they're sometimes even harder to keep. So, when I realized at some point a few years ago that we were friends, I think I somehow just decided that I would start doing whatever I had to do in order for this friendship to last because I want to be there when you do find the Hand of God. I think I want to help you find it."

"What if you find it first?" Hikaru idly played with a napkin. "I came into this world chasing you. I still haven't surpassed you. in my mind, I'm not sure I will."

"Then maybe we're meant to find it together."

Hikaru wiped his lips with his napkin and nodded. "Then I guess we should finish getting you set up and maybe go shopping so that we won't feel guilty when we spend the rest of the night playing."

"Let's go around the house first and make a list of things we need. And should we call first about getting Internet?"

Hikaru made a face. "I hate dealing with those people on the phone."

Akira nodded. "I'll make the call. Go find something to take notes on?"

Rising from the table, Hikaru smiled. "Thanks." He bowed his head slightly. "For everything, y'know."

"You, as well."

"Can we have ramen for dinner tonight?"

Akira narrowed his eyes at the other man. "Tonight, yes. Tomorrow night? No."

Laughing, Hikaru headed toward the kitchen. Akira grabbed for the phone book to look up the number for the local internet service provider.

Walking seperate paths, they ended up walking together.


End file.
